With digital privacy, security and anonymity in the public consciousness, thanks to information revealed by Edward Snowden, any tool or application that can help you communicate securely with your friends is always welcome.
One such tool that just been released is called Pixelknot. Developed by The Guardian Project for Android devices, Pixelknot is a steganography application “that allows users to hide short text-based messages in photographs and share them across trusted channels.”
Steganography is an old concept, so Pixelknot is not a ground-breaking application, but this is how it works. Say you wish to send a short, text message to a friend and you do not want an unauthorized person to see it. You take a picture with your smartphone, or use an existing image, type the message you wish to send, let Pixelknot work its image, then send the image on its way.
Simple and fun!
Pixelknot, like all software applications, is a work in progress, but the goal is to create an easy-to-use steganography app that even a trained eye cannot tell if the image used has been “altered.” It is now available on Google Play store. For code ninjas, the source code is available on GitHub.
Here is another steganography app for Android that by using loss less png image files is able to insert even large messages undetectably into images.
http://www.hideinplainsight.ca/